You file a complaint of discrimination from your supervisor with the EEOC or your employers HR department. Your supervisor starts to retaliate by harassing you. Do you have a case of retaliation? In the recent case of Esparza v. University of Texas at El Paso, __ S.W.3d ___, 2015 WL 4711612 (Tex. App.—El Paso 2015), […]
In the past unpaid Interns were not always covered by discrimination laws because they were not necessarily considered employees under State or Federal Discrimination laws. . There can be a question whether an unpaid intern is an “employee” protected by Chapter 21 or Title VII, but in the future an intern’s status as an employee
Are unpaid interns covered for sexual harassment? Read More »
In Alamo Heights Independent School District v. Clark, 2015 WL 6163252 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 2015), one female coach offended another—the employee who sued—by frequent comments about the her sexual anatomy. The Trial Judge dismissed the employees claim of sexual harassment on the employers argument that the harasser used the same behavior toward many employees, male
In Houston Methodist San Jacinto Hospital v. Ford, 483 S.W.3d 588 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2015), the employee claimed that she was being sexually harassed. Under the law of sexual harassment the sexual harassment must be either sever or pervasive. The employee claimed that while this was the “legal” standard the companies own policies and
In a discrimination case an employer can avoid liability for harassment by showing that it took proper and reasonable remedial action in response to an employee’s complaint about sexual harassment. However, this defense failed for the employer in River Oaks L-M. Inc. v. Vinton-Duarte, 469 S.W.3d 213 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2015). Despite the employee’s
Both State and Federal laws require an employer to accommodate an employee’s religious practice unless accommodation would cause an “undue hardship,” . The Courts have interpreted that to mean that almost any hardship will justify an employers refusal to accommodate. Probably one of the most common types of accommodation that a religious person might ask
To gain protection from retaliation under the opposition to discrimination clause of Title VII (Federal Law) or Chapter 21(State Law), an employee must have opposed conduct made unlawful by those same discrimination laws. However, there might be a question whether the employer reasonably should have understood the employee was opposing such conduct. In Rincones v.
In San Antonio Water System v. Nicholas, 461 S.W.3d 131 (Tex. 2015), the Texas Supreme Court overruled a jury verdict and held that an employee who admonished a manager for repeatedly asking two other employees out to lunch could not reasonably have believed the conduct she was “opposing” constituted sexual harassment. Although the admonishment occurred
How much time between the retaliatory act (discipline or termination) and complaint of discrimination is too much to support a claim of retaliation. In Texas Parks and Wildlife Dep’t v. Gallacher, 2015 WL 1026473 (Tex. App.— Austin 2015), the Austin court held that the passage of two months and one week between a supervisor’s discovery
Emotional distress claim can be brought after employer retaliation against an employee who filed a claim for lost wages. The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has found that a claim of emotional distress can be brought after an employer retaliates. In this case the employer sought to evict the plaintiff after he had brought claims